Yellow flowers

1parsnipflowersI’m about to lose half my audience.  Hands up those who don’t like, nay, loathe yellow flowers.

Too many of you.  But bear with me. I was a yellow flower refuser too.

I have borrowed that phrase shamelessly from Lisa. Her father-in-law is a lifetime courgette refuser. She mentioned it when she sent me a delicious recipe for courgette soup which their family call ‘soupe aux légumes’ so as not to put him off.

And it’s a similar trick to accommodate yellow in a garden scheme; you have to disguise them so as not to be put off.

The problem with yellow, it seems to me, is the intensity of the colour. Particularly in spring. I wouldn’t buy a yellow rose. Nor would I embrace those forsythia shrubs in bloom which are just so intense a yellow without the softening contrast of green foliage. poppy

Our mountains are dotted with genet in bloom – Spanish broom – and a few years ago every spring I would dutifully plod all over the farm cutting them out and trying to lever out the tough roots to stop them self seeding.  For self seed they do.

I think I’m more tolerant of them now. Or just too knackered to do that long, long walk with the secateurs.

(Update, the secateurs are still lost. I’m in mourning for my favourite tool.)

1parsnipfront doorDaffodils I tolerate as I’m so colour starved after winter. But I usually plant white Thalia daffs, and save my yellow ones for flower arranging and giving away.

But when you step into my vegetable garden you would be amazed or alternately appalled by just how much yellow I have embraced.

I let things go to seed. And the fennel and the parsnips prove to be the best friend to the flower arranger in late spring.

But I could never tolerate the yellow on their own. The self seeding poppies are in there too.

In a week or so I will have enough sunflowers (also self seeders) to add to this large pot of fennel and parsnip flowers. And you will then be able to put away your sunglasses or your shuddering disgust at this display ad actually dare to come back to this blog again.